Retailers are always trying to find ways to make the customer's experience more enjoyable. One way to make the customer experience more enjoyable is to make the overall shopping experience more efficient. In this regard, the less time that a customer spends shopping typically equates to a more enjoyable experience.
Retailers, such as grocery stores and the like, have recently implemented self-checkouts that allow the customer to scan and bag their items as a means of adding efficiency to the check-out process. Such self-checks outs have been welcomed by the customer and, as such, more and more self-checks are being added at grocery stores and other in-store locations to accommodate there widespread customer acceptance. However, while self-checkouts impart some degree of accelerating the check-out process, self-checks are not without their limitations and drawbacks in terms of check-out efficiency. For example, all too often a customer may experience a problem during the self-check that requires assistance from a self-checkout attendant and/or store manager. In other instances, customers new or not adept at the self-checkout process may add delay for those waiting to use a self out station.
Another drawback of the overall shopping experience is that a customer typically does not know the total amount of their purchase until they reach a check-out station (a sales associate checkout station or a self-checkout station). They only way for a customer to circumvent this problem is to use a calculator as they accumulate the products they desire to purchase and/or keep track of an estimated total purchase amount in their head.
Therefore, a need exists to create new ways for customers to conduct a purchase transaction (i.e., checkout) within retail locations. The desired purchase transaction system should be highly efficient so as to limit the amount of time that a customer spends at the retail location. Moreover, the desired purchase transaction system should allow customers the ability to track the total purchase amount as they shop and acquire products which they desire to purchase.